With Election Day just over two weeks away, Vice President Mike Pence has been tasked with winning over Democratic and independent swing voters in states that could prove crucial to President Trump’s reelection.
The “aggressive” schedule will focus on the economy and trade, “contrasting this administration’s record with the Biden-Obama record on China and number of manufacturing jobs that were lost in the Midwest,” Pence’s chief of staff Marc Short told reporters Monday.
“In particular, up in Maine, you’ll hear the vice president talk about some of the trade impacts specifically for Maine,” Short said. “As you know, the president spoke a lot about his negotiation with the EU on lobsters.”
A message comparing Trump and former President Barack Obama’s economic records “resonates in the Midwest,” Short said.
In the Upper Midwest, the team is hoping to draw “traditionally Democrat union voters or independent voters,” he said. “The reality is that we feel very confident that there’s enormous enthusiasm for the Trump-Pence ticket among Republican voters.”
Pence will hold about two rallies each day for the next week, kicking off in Maine’s 2nd Congressional District and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, where Trump held a rally last month.
Maine, like Nebraska, divides its electoral votes by congressional district.
In Maine’s 2nd District, Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden leads Trump by 0.3 percentage points, according to RealClearPolitics’s average of recent polls. While polling ahead of the 2016 election gave Trump a narrow half-point advantage against then-Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, on Election Day, he won by 10.4 percentage points.
According to RealClearPolitics’s average, Biden leads Trump by 4.4 percentage points in Pennsylvania, a state Trump won by 0.7 percentage points in 2016. Clinton led Trump by just over 6 points 15 days before the 2016 election.
Monday’s visit marks the vice president’s 10th visit to the swing state this year.
“In Pennsylvania, it just feels different as far as the level of enthusiasm and excitement,” Short said, noting a visit to Reading, Pennsylvania, on Saturday that saw about 1,400 registered attendees and “several hundred more that couldn’t get into the venue.”
Pence will hold rallies in New Hampshire and Ohio on Wednesday, in Michigan and Indiana on Thursday, and in Florida on Saturday.
On Friday, Pence will vote early in his home state of Indiana before traveling to Pittsburgh.
